68% of Facebook Users Don’t Think Suspicious Links Are Suspicious

Last week, we reported on an experiment that proved how bad social networks like Facebook and Twitter were at protecting their users from malware, but it turns out user error might be just as big a problem. A new study claims that a majority of users are unaware that suspicious posts on Facebook could pose a security risk–and that most users don’t use any kind of security solution to protect their accounts.

The study may be somewhat biased–it was carried out on behalf of internet security provider BitDefender–but the results are nonetheless depressing for those who want to believe the best of their online brethren: On average, participants had 137 friends on a social network, with 42% of those taking part admitting that that number included people that they didn’t actually know, and 68% of all participants admitting that not only did they warn friends about potentially bad links, but that they also tended to click on the links themselves, thus spreading the threat.

The author of the survey, Sabina Datcu, reports that 93% of the 2,700 participants said “they either don’t need a security solution for Facebook or that they were unaware of these solutions.” Clearly, it’s time for someone to educate the Internet.

Well, that, or it’s time for us to become considerably more selective about who we chat up on Facebook.